It’s unlikely that we’ll ever return to the heyday of drugged-out children’s programming that Sid and Marty Krofft brought us in the early ’70s with the likes of Lidsville, but the folks over at Nick Jr. seem to be channeling that same spirit with their show Yo Gabba Gabba. Apparently my 19-month-old daughter is now being indoctrinated into this hallucinogenic world. Right on!
Category Archives: Parenting
Parenting an infant… imposed insomnia and one-handed typing
Pardon the brevity (and any typos), but I’m typing one-handed while my slumbering one-week-old daughter slowly cuts off the circulation in my left arm.
I’m not bemoaning parenthood, though doubling the size of your brood certainly brings a new set of challenges. (At least we’re not outnumbered.) Especially when you’ve got a newborn who only sleeps peacefully at 2 PM or while being held. (As noted before, I’m in the latter situation here, being precisely as far away from 2 PM as possible.)
There’s not much more to say without beginning to sound like I regret and/or resent the role of father, when in fact, looking down at her beautiful, peaceful, sleeping face, nothing could be farther from the truth (although I wouldn’t mind terribly trading places with her at the moment).
Reflections on Parenting, After One Week of Experience
It’s 5:30 AM. I’m wide awake, having just endured the most harrowing diaper-changing experience so far in my short career as a parent. It’s a good time to reflect on what I’ve learned to date….
- You can never predict when the baby will come, especially when you are convinced that it couldn’t possibly come yet.
- There’s a reason they call it “labor.”
- Dads: If you agree to cut the umbilical cord on your new son, just be careful where you angle those big scissors. Leave circumcision to the experts.
- Once you’ve smelled it, everything smells like baby formula.
- Try not to ponder the implications of having a McDonald’s restaurant inside a hospital.
- Babies are neither as fragile nor as durable as they appear.
- Don’t burp the baby while wearing your favorite shirt. Or sitting on the brand new sofa.
- Yes, your baby really is the cutest in the world. Just don’t expect everyone else to see it.
- Try not to envision a dairy farm when your wife is pumping breast milk. At least, if you do, don’t tell her about it.
- A pack of 80 diapers doesn’t last as long as you’d think.
- The health insurance industry has an inscrutable logic all its own.
- Plan for everything to take twice as long as you expect it to. Then it will take approximately twice as long as that.
- Your physical coordination really is affected by sustained lack of sleep. Keep that in mind when your toes are exposed to large, heavy, moving objects.
- Having a baby is a good way to instantly enhance your popularity. Don’t let it fool you — it’s not you they’re interested in.
- There is no way to convey to a non-parent the pure joy you feel at the sight of a stinky, sticky mound of poop in a diaper, after a day and a half without one.
- Your thoughts at 5:30 AM are neither as lucid nor as profound as they seem.
- It’s all worth it. And then some.